Design, Technology and Society (Phd)

Program Coordinator: Prof. Dr. Banu Manav

Contact: banu.manav@khas.edu.tr

The “Design, Technology and Society” PhD program aims to produce qualified products, ideas, methods, research, and projects that will be developed within the framework of interdisciplinary design research emerging in the twenty-first century and contribute to the national and international development of our country in social, urban and technological fields.

Within the scope of the program, education, culture, art, and migration issues will be researched in the social field; R&D and digital transformation-oriented technology production and qualified human resources will be trained; housing, urban transformation, and urbanization issues will be developed through human-oriented, sustainable environment and design models.

Why should I apply for this program?

• To work as a researcher on multidisciplinary projects that develop new technologies and products and contribute to scientific research projects.
• To build a research infrastructure that connects design, society, art, and technology by focusing on areas such as architecture, interior design, industrial design, and theatre.
• To gain the knowledge to support the university’s design education and culture, sectoral collaborations, R&D infrastructure and research networks, with the support of national and international research projects.

The program’s standout features include

This doctoral program is an interdisciplinary design research program that integrates product design, architecture, urban development, art, and social issues. The program is focused on local development and is designed to be combined with theoretical and practical training models.

A summary on the specific concentration areas (if any)

Design Research

The Design Research area offers a unique opportunity to engage in interdisciplinary practices that foster critical and creative thinking. It provides students with a platform to explore, evaluate, and develop their analytical and creative abilities. This program encourages the development of visual, participatory, and creative perspectives. It examines the historical and contemporary interdisciplinary interactions within the field of design, as well as the potential for new forms of collaboration. It guides the combination of knowledge from different disciplines with design thinking. Students in this area will receive diverse support in the form of theoretical and practical courses, enabling them to design, develop, and implement their own independent research projects and theses. 

Architecture and Urban Studies Research

The field of Architecture and Urban Studies will spearhead the comprehensive, multi-scale conceptualization of the intertwined histories of architecture and cities. We will produce critical, interdisciplinary, and original research on the design, production, and representation of the built environment.

Performance Research

The field of Performance Studies will examine the distinctive characteristics, requirements, and expectations of Turkish cinema and theatre through a multidisciplinary approach, focusing on the concepts of drama and performance. The program will produce thesis works that will be supported by theoretical and practical courses, which will be developed through the intersection of design, technology, and social aspects of performance research. In this context, it is aimed to train the next generation of researchers in this field, who  will be able to holistically explore the interdisciplinary nature of film direction, stage design, dramatic writing, production, and acting.

• Names of the most important lessons and a summary of their content

This program offers three distinct specialisms, with a range of courses available in each. Details of these courses can be found below.

In the field of “Performance Research”;

Performance Research

To be able to analyze artistic practice in relation to social, cultural, and political theories related to contemporary performance, to examine the concepts of ritual and play in the context of performing arts.

The Art of the Director: Dramaturgy

In the “golden age” of screenwriting, the art of the director and the functions of actors, producers, and screenwriters as co-producers of this art are described. Theoretical and practical training on how the Producer-Actor-Screenwriter and Director of a film team can realize the art of the Director in the cinema together as “film narrators” is discussed.

Dramaturgy and Performance

To be able to analyze the dramaturgical structure of the performance within the framework of current debates in the field of Performance Studies, to review and discuss the theoretical and practical projections of the six basic elements of tragedy put forward by Aristotle in today’s art through character, plot, staging, and textuality.

Scenario Studios

Students experience the feature film writing process step by step through an idea they have developed themselves, and feature film writing techniques are studied.

Action Design

It is aimed to develop the dramaturgic structure formed by selected movement and physical expression. Physical improvisations developed with various methods are studied and analyzed.

Staging Style and Techniques

This course aims to discuss the working field of the theater director and his/her strategies for creating works. For this purpose, by examining the changing dynamic role of the theater director in historical perspective, students will be introduced to different directing tendencies; the dynamics that will mature the students’ critical view of political and aesthetic representation strategies will be investigated.

Physical and Dramatic Action

The aim of this course is to equip students with an understanding of physical action and dramatic action that allows them to use these tools efficiently to build the credibility of the character and to build new worlds by opening a space for creativity from the universe of the text to the art of the actor and director.

In the field of “Architecture and Urban Studies Research”;

Critical Theories and Current Debates in Urban Studies

In this compulsory course, different modules will be taught by different lecturers, and new theories, debates, and research methods in the fields of social sciences, geography, mapping, planning, architecture, landscape, historiography, anthropology, and cultural studies will be introduced and related to architectural and urban studies. Instead of separating theories and current debates from research methods, we see them as integral parts of a holistic research process.

Research Methods and Interdisciplinary Approaches

This compulsory course, delivered by three academics from different modules, introduces students to the fundamentals of social science research. Design disciplines, historical writing, and architectural and urban studies are among the cultural studies that employ research methods. Furthermore, the course encourages reflection on research design, with the objective of fostering awareness of the social, political, and economic factors that shape the fields of architecture and urban studies.

Architectural Morphology

This seminar will address some fundamental questions in architectural morphology by combining historical/theoretical readings with contemporary computational workflows. The research problems discussed in the course will cover a variety of topics such as architectural morphology, the relationship of form and symmetry in architectural heritage, the application of mathematical principles to the geometric study of architectural form, digital modeling, and discussion of growth and production rules in the analysis of buildings.

Ritual and Architecture

This interdisciplinary elective course aims to explore the city in relation to social events, festivals, rituals, and public spectacles. Important lines of enquiry in the discussions are the idea of commemoration, the ideological aspects of architectural and sculptural installations, and the architectural technologies and architectural philosophies shaped to manage public spectacles.

Readings on Space and Society

This course aims to introduce students to theoretical frameworks that focus on the discussion of the mutually constitutive relations between society and space. Through readings selected from different disciplines and interdisciplinary fields of study such as cultural anthropology, human geography, sociology, philosophy, feminist studies, and material culture studies, the main aim of the course is to provide students with a critical perspective to analyze architectural and urban space in relation to phenomena such as self, identity, otherness, culture, and power.

Space, Politics, and Power

This course focuses on the continuous reproduction of contemporary urban geographies and architectural spaces through politics, power structures, and typologies. We will reinterpret political philosophy and theories of power through ethno-spatial fieldwork and aesthetic/artistic productions with a focus on cities and architectural spaces.

Space and Social Gender: Feminist Approaches to Space, Place and Society

The contributions of gender studies to our understanding of social behavior patterns, cultural expression, and forms of intellectual inquiry, as well as our knowledge of the communities and everyday life in which we live, are now recognized in almost every field of social sciences. This course aims to introduce students to theoretical frameworks in gender studies that focus on space. By ‘space’ here, we mean not only the physical/real spaces that shape our everyday life experiences, such as residential spaces and urban spaces at different scales but also the imaginary/virtual spaces created in different media, such as architectural texts and drawings, literary writings and film.

In the field of “Design Research”;

Art-Design History and Theories

This course examines the conceptual cornerstones of design research from the nineteenth century to the present from social, political, technological, economic, and ecological perspectives.

Design, Art, and Urban Space

Transdisciplinary approaches to art, design and urban space in the world and in Turkey, conceptualization of space in the rich world of design and visual, audio and digital production in the ecological, political, economic and technological contexts of space in Turkey and in the world.

Design for Social Innovation

The aim of the course is to introduce students to the tools necessary for the development of new and innovative solutions to meet unmet societal needs by linking academic practice, market realities and available resources. The course explores the relationship between social entrepreneurship, social innovation and design through both literature and real cases and aims to provide students with an in-depth understanding of the relationship between theory and practice. Students will be able to present their proposals in the field of design for social innovation by producing academic literature and/or tangible or intangible outputs.

Human-Centered Design

The aim of this course is to introduce the basic concepts of Human Centered Design and to enable students to develop their own original applied research projects within this framework.

Design and Society

Designers influence the creation of products, symbols, infrastructure, and our environment, both real and virtual. In this context, designers must find pragmatic, creative, and innovative solutions, taking into account the challenges and obstacles facing society. The course focuses on the challenges facing today’s society and how these challenges relate to the act of design. The course aims to provide a grounding in the role and responsibilities of design in social issues.

Advanced Design Research

The aim of this course is to introduce students to the basic concepts of Human-Centered Design and to enable them to develop an original applied research project in their own discipline/area of interest.

Design Management

In the 20th century, product design gained importance as a competitive factor in parallel with globalization and positioned as a strategic resource. How design as a creative and innovative action and service interacts strategically with corporate management decisions within the integrated structure of the design discipline; the course aims to convey a design vision to students through cases from this framework.

Design with Light and Color

This course is about understanding “light and color” together with their implications in design. It involves an investigation of the physical and perceptual nature of light and light-based technologies, together with color theory. The physiological, psychological, and emotional effects of light and color in the visual arts, architecture, and the perception of space will be explored through analysis, computer simulations, and research. students will develop and present a research-based project.

• Lecturing academicians

Design Research (under the sub-heading of Built Environment)

• Dr. Banu Manav

Lighting System Design, Building Physics, Space Perception, Light and Health, Color Perception

• Prof. Dr. Konca Saher

Acoustic Measurements, Environmental Noise Analysis and Control, Acoustic Comfort, Building and Volume Acoustics

• Prof. Dr. Burcu Cigdem Yilmaz

Sustainability, Building Physics, Building Energy Performance, Life Cycle Cost, Environmental Impact, Decision-Making Methods

• Prof. Dr. Mine Koyaz

Building Element Design, Building Materials and Technologies, Building Performance, Facade Systems and Design, Sustainability, Building Physics

• Lecturer Dilara Kelle

Acoustic Comfort, Building and Volume Acoustics, Building Physics

Architecture and Urban Studies Research

• Prof. Dr. Ezgi Tuncer

Skilled migration & labor migration – the city and everyday life; displacement and place-making practices; ethnographic method; spatial analysis and mapping; border and political philosophy; space-power-politics; contemporary art and space; food and the city

• Prof. Dr. Didem Kılıçkıran

Theories of space, place and society; anthropology of space; feminist theory; gender and women’s studies; grounded theory and ethnographic research

• Prof. Dr. Ufuk Soyöz

Greek and Roman art and architecture; space and ritual; senses of sight and touch; architectural communication and representation

• Lecturer Gürbey Hiz

Architectural representation; visual culture; modernity; social space; architectural history; narrative theory and media archaeology; periodicals

Performance Research

• Prof. Dr Zeynep Günsür Yüceil

Body, movement, movement theatre, theatre, cultural studies

• Prof. Dr. Özlem Hemiş

Overview and representation theories, Theatre History and Theories, Contemporary Staging, Performing Arts in Turkey, Islamic Art

Design Research

• Prof. Dr. Ayşe Erek

History and Theories of Art and Design, Contemporary Art and Design Practices, Art and Design in Urban Space, History of Modernity, Cultural Heritage, Digital Methods in Art and Design Research

• Prof. Dr Ayşe Elif Çoşkun

Competition and Design, Strategic Design, Craft-based Industries, Craft and Design, Jewellery Design

• Prof. Dr. Ayhan Enşici

Design Methodology, Design Teams, Design Cognition, Innovation Management, Innovation Consultancy